Singularities is a new blog by Caitlin Denny hoping to start a new trend in discussing film with enthusiasm. She'll be doing interviews with filmmakers, reviews of screenings and films, listing upcoming events film related, and letting you know about some interesting findings of hers.
It's really hard to find any interesting on-line writing about cinema. Practically every other art form has a plethora of wonderfully obsessive and insightful blogs and web zines (with a few exceptions which I'll list at the bottom of this entry). Singularities hopes to start a new trend in discussing film with enthusiasm. I will be doing interviews with filmmakers, reviews of screenings and films, listing upcoming events film related, and letting you know about some interesting findings of mine.

This week's theme is: Exploitation Cinema

Anger's gay biker in Scorpio Rising

Usually seen as a low-quality degredation of art, exploitation cinema is probably the best thing to happen to film. Exploitation allows "offensive" humor and ideas to be expressed in the midst of repression (then and now). In Kenneth Anger's Scorpio Rising we find gay culture being represented through occultism and bikers, a dramatized metaphor for homosexuals' place in society at the time. But was Anger exploiting the gay population - why is it called exploitation? Simply because the films represent archetypes of our world - who in turn don't believe they are archetypes and would rather not be depicted in this way- being exploited.

Muybridge's Woman Walking Down Stairs

Artists like Eadweard Muybridge (he made "photographs in motion" or sequential photographs of nude people doing various activities) were able to work in this field of exploitation until it stalled from 1930-1968 because of the Production Code that was put into effect to wipe any sign of public indecency from cinema. The 1970's saw a huge resurgence of the genre, and this when some of the best classic exploitation films were made. It is famous for having sub-genres such as blaxsploitation, sexploitation, teensploitation, biker flicks, zombie films and spaghetti westerns. Your favorite filmmaker is probably an exploitation filmmaker of some kind or another. Obvious members of the genre include John Waters (Pink Flamingos, Female Trouble) and Ed Wood (Plan 9 from Outer Space, Glen or Glenda?), but also includes Larry Clark (KIDS, Wassup Rockers) and Todd Solondz (Happiness, Welcome To The Dollhouse).

left: Solondz's Welcome to the Dollhouse right: Clark's KIDS

Exploitation cinema allowed uncensored critiques of society come to fruition, inspiring artists of all mediums. It gave rise to lowbrow art in all it's glory. Dawn and her family in Welcome to the Dollhouse are exaggerations of the suburban family; the subtle approach to cliché through class and youth sexuality mark the current take on exploitation - a cinema for for those with euphoric attachments to surfaces and cynics of cultural organization. The archetypal teenagers in Larry Clark's KIDS are just being themselves, or rather acting like versions of themselves, therefore parodying what it is to be a teenager living in the Bronx in the mid 90's. Exploitation is all around us, you smell it in your morning coffee and see it ievery time you look in the mirror; use it as inspiration to change something or not change something.

Interview: Julian Vargas

Local Bay Area filmmaker Julian Vargas makes films about love. However, his roots as a Catholic schoolboy in Bogota, Columbia have definitely given him a bizarre outlook on the subject. It's no wonder he began making films about repressed sexuality and cultural abnormalties- those nuns are harsh! Vargas makes new classic exploitation films, meaning, he borrows aspects from the older films such as love in turmoil matched with nudity, and brings his own version of pop songs and family drama to play. See how floating crystals, happy endings and Nancy Sinatra fit into this unique artist's vision.

Caitlin Denny: Filmmaking, as most people know, takes quite a long time even with
the help of others - what is your process of working?

Julian Vargas: I usually start with a feeling or a narrative that comes from whatever is
going on in my personal life and whatever is surrounding me and influencing
me at the moment, it has to begin with the need of expressing something. The
goal is always to find the correct amount of abstraction without losing the
initial emotion. After this creative process, the production process is pure
organization and focus. I tend to make my films [through] the priority of my life, if
other things are distracting me I always feel that there is something wrong
with me. It can be challenging when your personal life is so attached to your
creative work but I don't see [any] other way to do it.

CD: Can you talk about the titles of your pieces and the origins of those
titles?

JV: I come up with them as if I was going to title a song. I like to think of my
movies as pop songs. I intend to make something that is delicious from start
to finish and keep you wanting for more. Great pop songs are catchy, unique
and somewhat strange and they always make you feel something inside.

CD: Why use cinema to translate your thoughts? What has cinema got to
offer that, say, sculpture can't offer? Would you be interested in working in
another medium?

JV: Cinema is the most open and accessible art , it's the only one that allows you
to integrate as many other art forms as you please.

I grew up with TV and film, and this influenced me from an early age. In my
adolescence I had to fight this influence, especially when [I] started caring about
finding love, it was really painful to realize that life doesn't work like the
movies, you have to learn that life can be a real shit and that what ends in a
happy ending after 2 hours of torture can take forever in real life and the
happy ending might never come. This kind of conversation with cinema, really
made me realize the impact it can have in our lives, and how comforting or
damaging it can be. Cinema is the art form that I feel more passionate and
obsessed about. I tried photography for a little bit, but I was too impatient, I wanted moving images. I believe I found what I love and I'm still not sick of it to drop it.

CD: Some people are shocked, and sometimes offended by your films. How do
you respond to this?

JV: I think it's a good thing. I've never been fond of playing it safe, I don't
like things to be static, I get bored easily, I think that things need to
change and nothing will change if everyone is being tame. I believe on putting
yourself out there and humiliating yourself a little or a lot if you have to,
and don't see a lot of people doing that, and it frustrates me, I don't mind
taking on the dirty work, somebody has to do it- plus, it's really the [most] fun
job.
Most of the work that I admire is not easily digestible. Causing someone a
massive diarrhea can be something to be proud of. I think that art should
challenge, provoke and produce some kind of change.

CD: Your work could be categorized in many different genres,
experimental, drama, comedy, exploitation, gay; how do you describe your work?

JV: At the moment my work is going through an experimental stage within narrative.
Currently I'm interested in the appropriation of film genres for the purposes
of personal expression. A lot of the work has a tendency for sexual deviance,
more than promoting a particular sexual orientation, I intend to create a
space of freedom where anyone is welcome.

CD: Your work illuminates the human drama of living, what are your
thoughts on your work as a philosophical mode of representation?

JV: I'm don't know if it works as a philosophical mode of representation, in fact
I'm not even sure what that means. If anything it is an abstraction of human
drama and fantasy.

CD: Who and what are the biggest influences on you and your work and why?

JV: I feel like every piece has a different set of influences, and some influences
tend to come more often than others. I tend to be influenced by artists who manage
to capture a balance between self-expression, humor and artistry, filmmakers
like Kenneth Anger and George Kuchar come to mind. Recently I had the chance
to see the work of Gilbert & George , another example of expert provocateurs
who work in a similar vein. I'm also very influenced by the work of Ingmar
Bergman, especially in films like "The Silence" and "Persona", he is a master on
communicating sexual tension, his cinematography is always impeccable.
Well-crafted pop songs are of great inspiration for creating narratives, the
works of Nancy Sinatra come to mind.

CD: How would you like you and your work to be remembered in 100 years?

JV: I don't really care. That's a long time.

CD: What's the last film you saw?

JV: I saw "Showgirls". You know they were planning to make a sequel. I think I
would like to make it. Nomi Malone needs a comeback.

Nothing's like screwing in a Bentley- except for watching BtVotD! I felt like two leprechaun hookers were making love to me as I watched the teen? rock band The Kelly Affair move to Hollywood, become sluts, alcoholics and paraplegics and get shot in the face all within the span of one week. However, the best word to describe this film is "cute". Everything is bright and fluffy, even the decapitation scene! One of the most exciting things about this film, besides the abundance of titties, is the Roger Ebert commentary available on the newly remastered DVD. YES I SAID ROGER EBERT! Ebert co-wrote the script of this outrageous film with director Russ Meyer. In the commentary you will hear Ebert note more than once on his influential and legendary writing spawning infamous sayings such as "This is my happening and it freaks me out! ", and "You will drink the black sperm of my vengence!" Within the scope of exploitation films BtVotD is one of the tamest, but also one of the most enjoyable for it's quality, a hit or miss trait in the genre.

Filmmaker of the Week: Doris Wishman

As one of the only, and certainly the most popular, female exploitation filmmaker, Doris Wishman is my filmmaker of the week. She began making nudist films in the 1960's and continued making films in other exploitation genres until her death in 2002, aged 90. Her cult following is for good reason, as Wishman's films are seen as proto-feminist for their strong female leads using tits and ass to their advantage. The Queen of Sexploitation, The Female Ed Wood, Wishman is a controversial film icon you should know about.

News of the Week:

John Waters lectures at the European Graduate School. He mentions a bad Elizabeth Taylor film titled "Boom!" as an inspiration. Watch his lecture, then watch part of "Boom!" below.

We haven't been featuring many interviews as of late. Let's change that up as we check in with a few local San Francisco artists like Kevin Earl Taylor here whom we studio visited back in 2009 (PHOTOS & VIDEO). It's been awhile, Kevin...

If you like guns and boobs, head on over to the Shooting Gallery; just don't expect the work to be all cheap ploys and hot chicks. With Make Stuff by Peter Gronquist (Portland) in the main space and Morgan Slade's Snake in the Eagle's Shadow in the project space, there is plenty spectacle to be had, but if you look just beyond it, you might actually get something out of the shows.

Fifty24SF opened Street Anatomy, a new solo show by Austrian artist Nychos a week ago last Friday night. He's been steadily filling our city with murals over the last year, with one downtown on Geary St. last summer, and new ones both in the Haight and in Oakland within the last few weeks, but it was really great to see his work up close and in such detail.

Congrats on our buddies at Needles and Pens on being open and rad for 11 years now. Mission Local did this little short video featuring Breezy giving a little heads up on what Needles and Pens is all about.

Matt Wagner recently emailed over some photos from The Hellion Gallery in Tokyo, who recently put together a show with AJ Fosik (Portland) called Beast From a Foreign Land. The gallery gave twelve of Fosik's sculptures to twelve Japanese artists (including Hiro Kurata who is currently showing in our group show Salt the Skies) to paint, burn, or build upon.

Backwoods Gallery in Melbourne played host to a huge group exhibition a couple of weeks back, with "Gold Blood, Magic Weirdos" Curated by Melbourne artist Sean Morris. Gold Blood brought together 25 talented painters, illustrators and comic artists from Australia, the US, Singapore, England, France and Spain - and marked the end of the Magic Weirdos trilogy, following shows in Perth in 2012 and London in 2013.

San Francisco based Fecal Pal Jeremy Fish opened his latest solo show Hunting Trophies at LA's Mark Moore Gallery last week to massive crowds and cabin walls lined with imagery pertaining to modern conquest and obsession.

Well, John Felix Arnold III is at it again. This time, he and Carolyn LeBourgios packed an entire show into the back of a Prius and drove across the country to install it at Superchief Gallery in NYC. I met with him last week as he told me about the trip over delicious burritos at Taqueria Cancun (which is right across the street from FFDG and serves what I think is the best burrito in the city) as the self proclaimed "Only overweight artist in the game" spilled all the details.

Ever Gold opened a new solo show by NYC based Henry Gunderson a couple Saturday nights ago and it was literally packed. So packed I couldn't actually see most of the art - but a big crowd doesn't seem like a problem. I got a good laugh at what I would call the 'cock climbing wall' as it was one of the few pieces I could see over the crowd. I haven't gotten a chance to go back and check it all out again, but I'm definitely going to as the paintings that I could get a peek at were really high quality and intruiguing. You should do the same.

The paintings in the show are each influenced by a musician, ranging from Freddy Mercury, to Madonna, to A Tribe Called Quest and they are so stylistically consistent with each musician's persona that they read as a cohesive body of work with incredible variation. If you told me they were each painted by a different person, I would not hesitate to believe you and it's really great to see a solo show with so much variety. The show is fun, poppy, very well done, and absolutely worth a look and maybe even a listen.

With rising rent in SF and knowing mostly other young artists without capitol, I desired a way to live rent free, have a space to do my craft, and get to see more of the world. Inspired by the many historical artists who have longed similar longings I discovered the beauty of artist residencies. Lilo runs Adhoc Collective in Vienna which not only has a fully equipped artists creative studio, but an indoor halfpipe, and private artist quarters. It was like a modern day castle or skate cathedral. It exists in almost a utopic state, totally free to those that apply and come with a real passion for both art and skateboarding

I just wanted to share with you a piece I recently finished which took me 4 years to complete. Titled "How To Lose Yourself Completely (The September Issue)", it consists of a copy of the September 2007 issue of Vogue magazine (the issue they made the documentary about) with all faces masked with a sharpie, and everything else entirely whited out. 840 pages of fun. -Bryan Schnelle

Jeremy Fish opens Hunting Trophies tonight, Saturday April 5th, at the Los Angeles based Mark Moore Gallery. The show features new work from Fish inside the "hunting lodge" where viewers climb inside the head of the hunter and explore the history of all the animals he's killed.

Beautiful piece entitled "The Albatross and the Shipping Container", Ink on Paper, Mounted to Panel, 47" Diameter, by San Francisco based Martin Machado now on display at FFDG. Stop in Saturday (1-6pm) to view the group show "Salt the Skies" now running through April 19th. 2277 Mission St. at 19th.

For some reason I thought it would be a good idea to quit my job, move out of my house, leave everything and travel again. So on August 21, 2013 I pushed a canoe packed full of gear into the headwaters of the Mississippi River in Lake Itasca, Minnesota, along with four of my best friends. Exactly 100 days later, I arrived at a marina near the Gulf of Mexico in a sailboat.

I don't think at this point it needs to be written since the last update to Fecal Face was a long time ago, but...

I, John Trippe, have put this baby Fecal Face to bed. I'm now focusing my efforts on running ECommerce at DLX which I'm very excited about... I guess you can't take skateboarding out of a skateboarder.

It was a great 15 years, and most of that effort can still be found within the site. Click around. There's a lot of content to explore.

I'm not sure how many people are lucky enough to have The San Francisco Giants 3 World Series trophies put on display at their work for the company's employees to enjoy during their lunch break, but that's what happened the other day at Deluxe. So great.

When works of art become commodities and nothing else, when every endeavor becomes “creative” and everybody “a creative,” then art sinks back to craft and artists back to artisans—a word that, in its adjectival form, at least, is newly popular again. Artisanal pickles, artisanal poems: what’s the difference, after all? So “art” itself may disappear: art as Art, that old high thing. Which—unless, like me, you think we need a vessel for our inner life—is nothing much to mourn.

Hard-working artisan, solitary genius, credentialed professional—the image of the artist has changed radically over the centuries. What if the latest model to emerge means the end of art as we have known it? --continue reading

"[Satire] is important because it brings out the flaws we all have and throws them up on the screen of another person," said Turner. “How they react sort of shows how important that really is.” Later, he added, "Charlie took a hit for everybody." -read on

NYC --- A new graffiti abatement program put forth by the police commissioner has beat cops carrying cans of spray paint to fill in and cover graffiti artists work in an effort to clean up the city --> Many cops are thinking it's a waste of resources, but we're waiting to see someone make a project of it. Maybe instructions for the cops on where to fill-in?

The NYPD is arming its cops with cans of spray paint and giving them art-class-style lessons to tackle the scourge of urban graffiti, The Post has learned.

Shootings are on the rise across the city, but the directive from Police Headquarters is to hunt down street art and cover it with black, red and white spray paint, sources said... READ ON

We haven't been featuring many interviews as of late. Let's change that up as we check in with a few local San Francisco artists like Kevin Earl Taylor here whom we studio visited back in 2009 (PHOTOS & VIDEO). It's been awhile, Kevin...

If you like guns and boobs, head on over to the Shooting Gallery; just don't expect the work to be all cheap ploys and hot chicks. With Make Stuff by Peter Gronquist (Portland) in the main space and Morgan Slade's Snake in the Eagle's Shadow in the project space, there is plenty spectacle to be had, but if you look just beyond it, you might actually get something out of the shows.

Fifty24SF opened Street Anatomy, a new solo show by Austrian artist Nychos a week ago last Friday night. He's been steadily filling our city with murals over the last year, with one downtown on Geary St. last summer, and new ones both in the Haight and in Oakland within the last few weeks, but it was really great to see his work up close and in such detail.

Congrats on our buddies at Needles and Pens on being open and rad for 11 years now. Mission Local did this little short video featuring Breezy giving a little heads up on what Needles and Pens is all about.

Matt Wagner recently emailed over some photos from The Hellion Gallery in Tokyo, who recently put together a show with AJ Fosik (Portland) called Beast From a Foreign Land. The gallery gave twelve of Fosik's sculptures to twelve Japanese artists (including Hiro Kurata who is currently showing in our group show Salt the Skies) to paint, burn, or build upon.

Backwoods Gallery in Melbourne played host to a huge group exhibition a couple of weeks back, with "Gold Blood, Magic Weirdos" Curated by Melbourne artist Sean Morris. Gold Blood brought together 25 talented painters, illustrators and comic artists from Australia, the US, Singapore, England, France and Spain - and marked the end of the Magic Weirdos trilogy, following shows in Perth in 2012 and London in 2013.

San Francisco based Fecal Pal Jeremy Fish opened his latest solo show Hunting Trophies at LA's Mark Moore Gallery last week to massive crowds and cabin walls lined with imagery pertaining to modern conquest and obsession.

Well, John Felix Arnold III is at it again. This time, he and Carolyn LeBourgios packed an entire show into the back of a Prius and drove across the country to install it at Superchief Gallery in NYC. I met with him last week as he told me about the trip over delicious burritos at Taqueria Cancun (which is right across the street from FFDG and serves what I think is the best burrito in the city) as the self proclaimed "Only overweight artist in the game" spilled all the details.

Ever Gold opened a new solo show by NYC based Henry Gunderson a couple Saturday nights ago and it was literally packed. So packed I couldn't actually see most of the art - but a big crowd doesn't seem like a problem. I got a good laugh at what I would call the 'cock climbing wall' as it was one of the few pieces I could see over the crowd. I haven't gotten a chance to go back and check it all out again, but I'm definitely going to as the paintings that I could get a peek at were really high quality and intruiguing. You should do the same.

The paintings in the show are each influenced by a musician, ranging from Freddy Mercury, to Madonna, to A Tribe Called Quest and they are so stylistically consistent with each musician's persona that they read as a cohesive body of work with incredible variation. If you told me they were each painted by a different person, I would not hesitate to believe you and it's really great to see a solo show with so much variety. The show is fun, poppy, very well done, and absolutely worth a look and maybe even a listen.

With rising rent in SF and knowing mostly other young artists without capitol, I desired a way to live rent free, have a space to do my craft, and get to see more of the world. Inspired by the many historical artists who have longed similar longings I discovered the beauty of artist residencies. Lilo runs Adhoc Collective in Vienna which not only has a fully equipped artists creative studio, but an indoor halfpipe, and private artist quarters. It was like a modern day castle or skate cathedral. It exists in almost a utopic state, totally free to those that apply and come with a real passion for both art and skateboarding

I just wanted to share with you a piece I recently finished which took me 4 years to complete. Titled "How To Lose Yourself Completely (The September Issue)", it consists of a copy of the September 2007 issue of Vogue magazine (the issue they made the documentary about) with all faces masked with a sharpie, and everything else entirely whited out. 840 pages of fun. -Bryan Schnelle

Jeremy Fish opens Hunting Trophies tonight, Saturday April 5th, at the Los Angeles based Mark Moore Gallery. The show features new work from Fish inside the "hunting lodge" where viewers climb inside the head of the hunter and explore the history of all the animals he's killed.

Beautiful piece entitled "The Albatross and the Shipping Container", Ink on Paper, Mounted to Panel, 47" Diameter, by San Francisco based Martin Machado now on display at FFDG. Stop in Saturday (1-6pm) to view the group show "Salt the Skies" now running through April 19th. 2277 Mission St. at 19th.

For some reason I thought it would be a good idea to quit my job, move out of my house, leave everything and travel again. So on August 21, 2013 I pushed a canoe packed full of gear into the headwaters of the Mississippi River in Lake Itasca, Minnesota, along with four of my best friends. Exactly 100 days later, I arrived at a marina near the Gulf of Mexico in a sailboat.

Material published on FECAL FACE DOT COM online service is copyrighted by Fecal Face or its licensors, including the originating wire services. Such material is protected by U.S. and international copyright laws and treaties. All rights reserved.

Users of the Fecal Face online service may not reproduce, republish or redistribute material found on the web site in any form without the express written consent of the copyright holder.